The Way You Die
Anthony Rain

Small waves crashed onto the shore, their caps topped with pinkish-orange light from the early sun. I was camped out on the sand just beyond the foamy surf, sitting in a neon green lounge chair and drinking a cup of strong coffee. A pair of young female surfers provided my morning entertainment.
I had first come to Cocoa Beach with a girlfriend six years earlier, when she and I were visiting Miami. We had decided to cruise north up A1A on a lark, and I discovered a piece of nirvana. The girlfriend is now history, but my devotion to Cocoa and the expansive ocean beyond it is still going strong.
I am an urbanite by birth and habit, and New York City is my home, but somewhere deep in the mix that makes up my soul, lives a beach bum looking to kick back and stretch out under the sun. The world be damned.
I took a sip of coffee and watched a flock of seagulls take off lazily over the grassy dunes. I envied them their freedom. The only thing that could make this moment better I thought, would be the knowledge that I never had to leave, never had to go back to my PI practice in New York.
The only thing that could ruin this moment suddenly happened: my cell phone rang.
I put my mug down on the soft, white sand and answered. "Hello." I tried to sound as unenthusiastic as possible.
"Miles, its Brian. I got something good for you."
Brian was the bartender at McGee’s Pub down the block from my office on West 55th Street in Manhattan. He was a former minor league baseball player, an ex-catcher with large, hard-looking hands, who often bought me house drinks. In my case, that consisted of either Corona or Glenfiddich. Brian viewed all the regulars at McGee’s as one, big, happy team, and he constantly went out of his way for us. He was a rare bird.
Nonetheless, he was interrupting my vacation and the need to put urban angst temporarily far behind me.
"How did you get my cell number?" I was edgy from a lack of caffeine and picked up the coffee mug for another jolt. A sand crab on an exploratory mission spied me and ran sideways for his hole.
"You gave me this number. Look, I got a job for you. An easy job that will pay mucho bucks."
Under normal circumstances, I considered most jobs that came my way, turning down only those that overtly asked me to steal, or kill. In my line of work, people got killed and I was ok with that. But, I wouldn’t do it for hire.
My practice is five years strong and I made a decent income, but I had dry spells here and there, despite the tech-driven booming economy. The extra work helped me over those humps.
"What’s the job?"
"A friend of a friend called me last night just before closing. He said he knows someone who needs a package taken to New York City. The guy who has the package lives in Cocoa Beach. How perfect is that?"
I must have had too many drinks one night, because I didn’t recollect telling Brian where I was going. My usual modus operandi is to slip quietly away, before anyone noticed I was gone.
"The guy is willing to pay a large fee, Miles. I thought of you right away because you’re a PI."
"The guy specifically asked for a PI?"
"Well, more or less," said Brian. "He wants someone in the security business. The package is valuable and he wants someone who can handle a gun. Do you want the name and number?"
"It’s a large fee?"
"So he says."
"Ok. I’ll give him a call and check it out. Depending on how easy it is, and if I take it, I’ll give you a percentage of what I earn. I appreciate your throwing the work my way." I try to be nice when I can.
Later that afternoon, I headed south on A1A for the address the man had given me on the phone. He said his name was Johnny Donatello and his place was next to the Dolphin Motel.
When I pulled up, I saw a pink stucco ranch house that made me think of cotton candy. There was a large palm tree on the front lawn, and the house was bordered by smaller palm trees and several leafy, overgrown plants. I crossed a brown-green lawn that crunched underfoot and knocked on a white door that had flecks of paint peeling off.
A tall man, bone thin with graying blonde hair and dull, blue eyes opened the door. He held a burning cigarette in a pasty, skeletal hand.
"Hello. I’m Miles Beckett," I said.
The man continued to stare at me and slowly raised his cigarette to his mouth, but a sudden, deep dry cough kept him from inhaling. He bent over until the spasm passed. Straightening back up, he shifted his gaze past me and out onto the nearly deserted street. He stepped to the side and gestured me into the house, all the while looking over my shoulder.
The interior was dark and cold. Although the house sat just this side of the Atlantic and probably had a spectacular view, all the blinds had been pulled down. The central air was quiet, and I could occasionally hear the crash of a wave upon the shore. I had an urge to pull up all the blinds just for my benefit, but I thought the sunlight might make my frail, pasty client vaporize.
The living room had two sofas big enough to be small islands in the center of the room. There were cigarette burns in the beige fabric. Large marble end tables ornately carved and large china lamps in the shape of curly-haired cherubs were situated around the sofas. An off-white carpet lay underneath our feet.
"I want to see some identification," he said.
I showed the man my driver’s license and PI card.
"I need someone who can take care of himself. What do you carry?"
"Ed Brown 1911." The .45 had belonged to my brother. I took it after he died in a gun battle two years ago. It has great action and I decided to keep it as my weapon of choice.
"When I had to use a gun, I used a .38 revolver," said Donatello. "It took a little more finesse and guts than an automatic. Then I stopped relying on guns altogether." He kept a pair of deadpan eyes trained on me.
"Were you in law enforcement?"
"No." He coughed and then changed the subject. "The job consists of you bringing some money to a friend. You give him the cash and leave. That is all I’m asking you to do."
"How much money are we talking about, Mr. Donatello?"
"One million dollars."
"And who is the lucky friend?"
"For reasons I won’t explain, I’m going to call him Mr. Smith. He lives in Brooklyn. Mr. Smith will be expecting you. I want you to drive the money back. If you flew down, cancel your return trip. The money never leaves your sight."
"I’d rather know the identity of the person I’m handing this money over to, Mr. Donatello." I saw a faint flush come to his cheeks.
"I’m going to pay you ten grand to do this job, and that should satisfy your curiosity." He was pretty damn accurate about that.
Donatello walked away from me and headed into the dining room trailing a vapor of cigarette smoke. He gestured for me to follow. He turned on a glass chandelier that had hundreds of clear pendants hanging down from the center. Under it and resting on a long white wooden dining table sat a black suitcase.
Donatello opened the case and I saw rows of new-looking hundred-dollar bills. I could smell a slight sharpness from the ink and paper. The money looked as beautiful as the ocean.
"I can’t bring this to Mr. Smith myself, because my health is failing."
"It’s none of my business, but maybe you should lay off the cigarettes," I said. I felt like a hypocrite saying it, because I used to be a smoker myself. Long hours of boring surveillance work had turned me into a chain smoker. I finally broke the habit last year with the help of a shrink.
"It doesn’t matter," said Donatello. "I have prostate cancer and it’s spreading. I’ll be dead soon, so my doctors tell me."
He stopped and coughed again. When it passed, he went on talking. "Mr. Smith is a tough man. He may ask you some questions, though he will be happy just to have the cash back. Try to be brief. Show him the money and then go quickly. It will be to your advantage."
"Have it back?" I asked. "Did you steal it from him?" I wasn’t judging the man. I had no problem with his stealing it. I merely wanted to know where I stood.
Donatello looked at me with dull eyes that flickered for an instant. I had the sense that in his better days, that flicker would be a last warning, like a snake’s hiss before the strike. "I borrowed it," he said. "I had just been diagnosed and needed the money. I don’t need it anymore."
"Is Smith an old friend?"
Donatello went into another coughing fit. He wiped his mouth with his bony hand. "You could say that Mr. Smith made me what I am today."
"You’re a dying man," I said.
"And when I meet my maker, I’ll be a condemned man for eternity." He closed the suitcase. "I want Mr. Smith to have this."
He turned and walked into the living room. I followed him, noticing pieces of copper wire on the dining room carpet.
"When can you leave for New York?" he asked me as I walked up to him.
"I have a week’s worth of vacation left. If it’s ok with you, I want to finish it. So, next weekend?"
"I’ll see you then, Mr. Beckett."
I stopped just past the doorway. "How do you know I won’t steal the money from you?"
He stared hard at me. "I inquired about you after you called this morning. I don’t think you will. If you do, I’ll hire someone else to find you and kill you." He closed the door.
I spent the next week soaking up the sun and swimming in the warm ocean. When I was hungry or wanted a drink, I went to a restaurant on the boardwalk called Beach Break. I became friendly with Eileen, a waitress with a fun-loving manner and hair the color of molten lava. She had a fiery passion in bed and we had some good times.
The following weekend, I packed up and drove to Donatello’s pink house. The sun was especially hot and the humidity so heavy that a fine mist rose from the road.
Donatello opened the door and walked to the back of the house. I followed him inside. He looked worse than before.
"You open the suitcase, show him the cash. He’ll give it a quick count, which is ok, but then you leave. If he asks you where I am, you can tell him. I don’t plan on dying in this house. There’s a special place I’ve chosen to spend my last days."
"You make it sound like you’ve been hiding out from your friend."
"I’ve been hiding out from the world. I think you understand that Mr. Beckett." I had to hand it to him, he was right again.
He told me to wait and went into the next room. I noticed some boxes sitting on several chairs in the corner. I looked in one of them and saw a stack of photos. One of the photos caught my eye. It was taken years ago, maybe in the seventies. I recognized a younger Donatello, a sneer boring into my eyes. He was seated at a table with a group of young men who looked like wise guys. Men dressed in slick dark suits and laughing into the camera lens. Donatello held a stick of dynamite in his right hand underneath a cigarette dangling from his lips. Two of the others held guns, one pointing his at the picture taker.
I looked up and noticed Donatello staring at me. I put the photos down and he handed me an envelope. Inside were more of those hundred-dollar bills. I counted one hundred of them, then put the envelope in my pocket.
Donatello looked at the money in the open case for a few seconds and then closed it. He locked the case and handed me the key. "Do not open it until you are with Mr.
Smith."
"You sound like you don’t trust me after all." Donatello didn’t answer me.
I picked up the suitcase. "Keep it in the backseat and with you in the motel room. Don’t lose sight of it," said Donatello.
"Don’t worry. Mr. Smith will get every C note."
"I want to thank you. Your giving him this money will make my last days very peaceful."
"Hang in there Donatello." I didn’t know what else to say to him. The man was facing his mortality. He seemed so much wiser than me at that moment.
It took me only two days to reach New York, with one stopover in Virginia. I had a steady stream of Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald and Miles Davis music playing on the car CD system. When I needed a change of pace, I popped in Pink Floyd. I did no less than seventy the whole way back and the money never left my sight.
Once or twice on the drive up, I thought about taking the cash. I had never had a million dollars in my possession before. It was tempting. I wasn’t afraid of Donatello coming after me. He looked like he would blow away the minute he stepped out of his house. And his threat rang hollow to me. I guess I decided that in the end, the ten grand was taking advantage enough.
The address for Mr. Smith was on Henry Street in Carroll Gardens. I pulled up to a narrow, brown storefront with closed curtain windows adjacent to an alley. There were two houses across the way, but mainly it was a deserted block. The sidewalk out front had huge cracks.
I knocked on the door and a young man with gold chains around his neck and frosted hair answered. He looked to be in his early twenties, a full decade younger than me.
"What do you want?" he asked.
"I’m here to see Mr. Smith. I have a package for him from Johnny Donatello."
The kid eyed my hands and saw I wasn’t carrying anything. "It’s in the car."
"Go get it," he said.
I went and got the cash from the backseat. I noticed the kid had a heavily chromed .45 in his hand.
"Let’s see what’s inside," he said.
"Not you. Only Smith."
The kid looked at me for a few seconds, then opened the door and told me to walk to the rear. He stuck his gun into the small of my back.
The store was really some kind of social club inside. There was a long bar with a full complement of liquor. A soccer game was playing on a TV in the corner. The announcers spoke in Italian. Some old men sat in a couple of beat-up armchairs in front of the TV drinking red wine from table glasses. Sinatra was playing on the stereo.
Several young men in tee shirts and athletic pants were sitting at the bar. They stopped talking when I walked inside. All of them had gun bulges visible under their shirts. There was enough firepower in here to hold the FBI at bay for days.
I stopped at the back door and the young man with the gold chains knocked on it. The door opened and a very large man peered out. His head was shaved and he had a blue tarantula tattoo on his right scalp above the ear.
"This is the guy bringing the cash from Johnny Berlin," said the young man.
The large man with the tattoo opened the door wider, but his frame completely blocked the entrance. He pointed a cannon in my face and said, "Frisk him, Orlando."
I put the suitcase down and held out my arms. Orlando removed the Ed Brown from my holster. He looked at it, turning the gun over in his hands.
"It has great action," I said. The young man stuck the gun in his waistband. I picked up the suitcase, and then the larger man grabbed me by the left arm and pushed me into the room.
Inside was a small office. A man in his late fifties was sitting behind a desk. He had jet-black hair cut short and neat. There was no gray in his hair, so he must have had a dye job. He had a tan better than mine and wore a blue polo shirt. His dominant feature was eyes that bulged out behind silver-framed glasses. He looked like he was being perpetually garroted.
"Put the suitcase over here," he said and pointed to his right. The desk held a mobile phone, an open edition of the New York Daily News and a bowl with several brown pears.
I put the suitcase down and started to unlock it. He held up his hand. "We can get to that. Sit down. Sal, put the gun away."
I reluctantly sat in a hard wooden chair on the opposite side of his desk. He took out a penknife, grabbed a pear and cut a chunk out of the flesh, then popped it into his mouth. "Who the fuck are you?"
"Miles Beckett, private investigator."
"Where did you meet Johnny Berlin?" he asked. The slurping sounds coming from his mouth were both making me sick and reminding me that I hadn’t eaten yet that day.
"I got a call about a week and a half ago, while I was on vacation in Cocoa Beach. I was told a man needed a package brought back to New York. He called himself Johnny Donatello."
"Yeah, well, we called him Johnny Berlin because he had blond hair and blue eyes. He looked more German that Italian. Anyway, that prick stole 1.5 million from me two years ago. I can see that he was living large, since I’m only getting one million back. Unless you have it?" He cut another piece out of the pear.
"No, I don’t have it. He has cancer, so I guess he used a good portion of it on his medical bills." A bell was going off in my head. Johnny Berlin sounded familiar to me, but I couldn’t quite place the name.
"I’m supposed to feel sorry for that piece of shit?" The man snorted. "He tried to borrow money from me when he first got cancer. I told him I was no charity. If he wanted money, it would be a short-term loan, plus interest. So, he goes and rips me off. And I promoted him to be one of my closest advisors." The man slammed his hand down on the desk and the bowl jumped up. After a few minutes of noisy eating, he seemed to compose himself. "Did he tell you who I am?"
"No."
"I’m Gus Rialto."
He didn’t need to elaborate. The name said it all. From what I had read in the papers, Gus Rialto, AKA Gus ‘Squid’ Rialto, so named because of his bulging eyes, was a scumbag that ran a drug trade in Red Hook for one of the major families. I understood why Donatello didn’t give me the name.
"How much did Berlin pay you?"
"Ten grand." He didn’t like the amount. He stuck the knife into the desk.
"That’s ten of my money. I should have Sal shoot you and take it back. Should we shoot him, Sal?"
I was going to tell him that he could have his dirty money back, and that I would be glad to shove it into his noisy, slurping little mouth. But then I had a better idea.
"Either shoot me, or I’m going. I have other things to do than bullshit all day with you, Rialto." I stood up and Sal made a move towards me. I measured the reach I would need to punch Sal in his throat. Nothing stops a man like a blow to the Adam’s Apple.
Rialto waved him off. "That’s ok, Sal. Beckett is being disrespectful because he’s nervous. Let me see the cash motherfucker and then you can go."
I unlocked and opened the suitcase. The same rows of hundred-dollar bills that I had seen back in Florida stared me in the face. I hated the thought of giving it to a lowlife like Rialto.
Rialto counted one packet from the top. There were one hundred C notes in the packet. Then he counted twenty packs on top and five packets deep. "Fine. It seems to be all here. I’ll have Sal count it officially in a little while. If one note is missing, I’ll hunt you down Beckett." He smiled wide like a shark.
"I’m in the phone book," I said. I turned and walked out.
Back in the rental car, I put my returned .45 in my holster and dialed Det. Sgt. Charles Driscoll of the Fifth Precinct in Manhattan on my cell. Driscoll had been a patrolman when I first started out solo, after quitting my first PI job with Stewart Investigations. We had grown to respect one another. I wanted Driscoll to get me a contact name on the Organized Crime Investigation Division. I would donate my ten grand as evidence, minus my expenses plus Brian’s cut. Since the money was new, I was figuring Berlin had taken it before Rialto had a chance to launder it two years ago.
I had just punched Driscoll’s number into my cell phone, when there was a sudden loud boom and a brilliant flash of light. The social club turned into an orange ball of flame that shredded as it flew outward. I threw myself down on the front seat, as my car shook and nearly tipped over. I could hear pieces of wood and concrete land on the roof and hood. The windows were sprayed with shrapnel.
I put my head up when the falling debris more or less stopped some seconds later. Where the social club had just been, there was now a churning cloud of black smoke and red cinders pouring from a large opening. It looked like a hole to hell had been punched open. Debris was blown out onto the street and I could see several still bodies.
I heard someone on my cell phone saying "hello, hello." I hung up. I then remembered who Johnny Berlin was. He had been a mob hit man for the Gallo family. He was adept at killing his victims in various ingenious ways, though his favorite weapon of choice was the explosive.
I remembered him saying it was in my best interest to show the cash and leave quickly. The son of a gun wanted me to get out before the timer kicked in the detonator. The triggering mechanism must have been unlocking the case.
Fire trucks and police cruisers pulled up and went into action. I got out of my car and waited for the patrol officers to come over and question me. Black ash fell from the sky.

Anthony Rain makes his home in New York City. This is his first published story in PWG, and he is currently working on his first hardboiled mystery novel featuring Miles Beckett, Private Investigator.